


Home Is Where The Heartbreak Is

by therearethingsineed



Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: M/M, Time Skips
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-06-09
Updated: 2013-06-09
Packaged: 2017-12-14 10:56:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/836133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/therearethingsineed/pseuds/therearethingsineed
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's been four years, and Ian's coming home to visit. But home is where the heartbreak is, and he doesn't know how long he can stand it this time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Home Is Where The Heartbreak Is

**Author's Note:**

> I'm back on the Gallavich train, attempting to write a chaptered fic. We'll see how it goes, but I'm hoping for some positivity. If you guys like it, let me know, and if you have any ideas, leave a comment or a message! Thanks!

It had been a fucking mess.

Five and a half years ago, when he'd first hopped the bus to basic training, his life had been further down the shitter than he'd have cared to remember. The bus ride had made him consider all the things he'd ignored in his desperate flight from home. The implications his decision could have on Lip. His family. The fact that the military was bound to check his Social Security, bound to find out. He turned around the moment he arrived, stood straight and tall when he told them that he had lied. He told them the truth; he'd just wanted to get out of South Chicago.

They hadn't turned him in, hadn't put a mark down on his record. They'd just nodded and said to come back when the time was right.

When he got home, no one was the wiser. They'd believed him when he'd said he'd been on an ROTC retreat. The only person who knew he'd left was Mickey, but the two avoided each other with admirable effort.

On those chillier nights, when Ian was feeling particularly lonely in his bunker, he thought about Mickey. About the thug who had made his heart race, his palms sweat. He had been seventeen when they had broken up for good. The day he turned eighteen, he shipped out under his own name. Debbie was crying, and Lip refused to say goodbye. Carl was proud, and Fiona was quiet. Liam just smiled.

And that beautiful, sad thug was no where to be seen.

It had been just over two-thousand days, two-thousand nights, and he stood on the street where the bus had dropped him off, entirely unsure of what he was supposed to do. His fingers were sore from holding his duffel and his lips were chapped. The air was cold and stung his cheeks, but he didn't move. He couldn't.

He had no idea where to go.

They knew he was coming home, his family. Debs had insisted on keeping up contact via letters, and he'd done his best to respond to every single one while he was gone. So many times, he'd wanted to ask if the delinquent from three streets down was doing alright, but he never did. Instead it was a bunch of "You still got electricity?"'s and "Has Frank died yet?"'s. 

Eventually he began to walk. Slow, stiff steps, evenly measured and no where near as confident as they should have been. He was decked in his fatigues, but they didn't shield him the way they used to. They were just clothes to him now, nothing more, nothing less.

He was twenty-two, but he still felt like a seventeen year old. He remembered every small nuance of his home, had even dared to miss it when he thought his soul wouldn't notice. Most of his army brethren had loved hearing stories about his days in Chicago. Many had come from similar circumstances, or admired the straits he'd been raised in. Either way, the tale about Lip and his robot championship was always a hit. 

There was a small boy playing in the front yard of his childhood home, his small body covered in snow gear and scarves to plug the rips and holes. At first, Ian was sure it was Carl, but the boy turned to reveal dark skin and darker hair. Liam. The child would never remember him, much less recognize him. He approached awkwardly, adjusting his duffel over his shoulder, trying to look friendly.

When he was within a foot of the gate, Liam noticed, and bolted up the steps. He was screaming for Fiona.

What followed was a procession. First Fiona, holding the bat like the mad woman she was, then two other teens. A tall man with blond hair followed, looking unhurried and clean cut. Ian's eyes flitted back to the teens, who he registered as his siblings after a good second look. There was silence for a moment as they took in the scene, and then Debbie whooped, leapt off the stairs and ran to him in her stocking feet. Despite being nearly seventeen now, he still picked her up and swung her around. "Hey, beautiful," He murmured happily, tucking his face into her shoulder and holding her tight. She smelled like apple pie and family.

"Ian!" The family followed Debbie, crowding around him, hopping up and down from the chill. He allowed himself to be ushered inside. They reintroduced him to Liam, who seemed to warm up to him after a few minutes. Within a half hour, you would have thought he'd never left.

"I've called Lip," Fi said with a grin. Everyone else had been gathered around the couch, listening to his war stories, and telling him their own tales of horror.

He hadn't had to ask; Debbie told him Frank had left a few weeks ago, and had yet to reappear. Not unusual, he'd thought. It wasn't as if his company was sorely missed. 

His brother, on the other hand, was a different story. Lip had been Ian's best friend, and the person he'd missed most while overseas. He'd longed for those nights they spent staying up late and talking, joking over beers, sharing joints. They had been partners in crime, a perfectly oiled machine that could have handled anything together. And they hadn't seen each other in so long.

From Debbie's letters, he'd known Lip had given in and gone to college. MIT, as it were. He'd graduated in three years, and had delivered a commencement address that had become a viral video online. Apparently, the use of the word "fuck" hadn't before been used in such a setting, and never so copiously. 

Since graduating, he'd come to live in the heart of the Windy City, in some kick-ass apartment, working for the University. He visited his siblings regularly and sent annual checks that kept the squirrel fund nice and fat. And despite refusing to say goodbye to Ian when he'd left, they promised him that Lip had missed him just as much, if not more, than anyone else.

It was a long, stretched out half hour as they awaited the arrival of the final Gallagher sibling. Carl was playing Xbox, Liam watching on in awe. Debbie was talking about a boy she liked, and Ian nodded courteously while watching the door. Fiona was watching him.

He looked older.

No taller or wider. His muscles had thickened, sure, but not by much. He'd already been large when he'd left, so in-shape. His face lacked the same sweetness it had once possessed, and his eyes looked smaller, more narrow. His hair was buzzed, and his jaw had squared off to look impossible sharp. His skin, once bright and clear, looked duller, and more flat. He looked tired, more than anything else. He had been telling the kids about his war buddies, funny stories and the like, but she saw his eyes drift every once in a while, saw him clench his fists when no one was looking. She was sure there was more he wasn't saying. 

He needed his older brother.

Lip arrived exactly thirty-six minutes after being called, and looked nearly the same as he had when Ian had left. Sharp, blue eyes and shaggy brown hair, coupled with hoodrat charm and an obnoxious air of superiority. He came in through the kitchen, breezed right past Fiona and the kids, and caught his brother up in a massive hug.

They stayed like that for a whole minute, gripping each other around the shoulders and being silent and manly. She looked at Mike, her boss slash boyfriend, and smiled. Things were going to be okay.

When the brothers pulled apart, they were grinning and demanding drinks. Everyone was old enough except for Liam, so beer was shared liberally and gaily throughout the living room. Veronica and Kevin popped in after hearing the clinking of bottles, and the celebration last until the sun was beginning to rise the next morning.

Despite being hung over and tired, Ian rose early, pulled on a pair of sweats and a ratty sweater, and went jogging. He needed to stay in shape, and running kept him sane. Kept him focused.

He was three blocks away when he realized the direction he was running in.

Turning, he looked just behind him. He could see the outline of a small, beaten house, just around the corner. The door would have address numbers nearly shredded with age, and the lawn would be littered with beer bottles and cigarette butts.

The Milkovich house.

And someone was standing outside of it. 

Someone he knew.

He wasn't close enough to see many details, but he recognized those shoulders, could pick out the coal colored hair against the relief of the snow covered porch.

Mickey.

His heart plummeted into his stomach and his palms felt slick. His teeth bore into his lower lip, and he couldn't fight the compulsion to walk closer. He didn't even try to stop himself. God fucking damn it, he had missed Mickey more than he could have said in words. He had found friends, support, in the military. He had moved on, in his own half-assed way. He'd found a partner or two. Fucked a stranger without murmuring the wrong name. In spite of time and distance and nights spent telling himself it was over, he couldn't bring himself not to yearn for the touch of the boy he had once loved so strongly.

He wondered idly if Mickey was still married. Probably. He had always been a pawn when it had come to his father's wishes, but Ian had stopped blaming him for that. Terry was ten kinds of fucked up, but Mickey had loved him, had idolized him, at least once in his life. In return, he'd been beaten half to death, and raped. The very memory made Ian cringe, made his steps falter. The only person he blamed these days was himself.

He was close enough now, standing at the street sign, that he could see the familiar knuckle tattoos, could see the glint of a wedding band. The delinquent was standing in front of his home, smoking, a cup of coffee in one hand. Mickey had never been an early riser before, but he went about his business like it was routine. Ian reminded himself that things had changed in his time away. Mickey didn't look an inch different, though. He had the beginnings of a beard, and his hair was pushed back messily, as if he had recently risen from bed. He looked longer and a little thinner, but not necessarily taller. He had always looked older than he really was, but standing there in his sweats and his bathrobe, coffee in one hand, a cigarette in the other, he looked unbelievably young.

Ian had always thought he had been the only one who had found Mickey attractive, and it was probably because it was true. He wasn't a conventionally handsome guy. He looked like an angry pitbull two thirds of the time, and a murderous viper the other third. In their time together, Ian had got to see so much more of him, and those memories made his chest ache with longing. He had a wonderful smile, Mickey. If only he showed it to other people.

It didn't take long for the delinquent to notice he was being watched. Keen as ever, he glanced up and locked eyes with Ian, who had the fortune of being disguised by his dirty workout hoodie and the glaring morning sun. "What the fuck are you looking at?" Mickey shouted. Ian couldn't help a small smile. He sounded the same, that was certain. "You think that's funny, shithead?" Mickey called, flicking away his cigarette and approaching the fence that separated them.

"No," Ian responded automatically. Something, some expression, danced across Mickey's face, but he chose to ignore it. It would be dangerous to read into anything. He should just leave. 

Turning to go, he hunched his shoulders against the breeze, tried not to hear the crunching of snow that meant his ex was so very, very close to him. "Turn the fuck around." Mickey said, his voice devoid of anger. It was cold, demanding. Almost desperate. Ian froze. "You turn around, you fucker, or I swear to God I'll--"

Ian turned. They were only a few feet apart. Just a few inches of snow and a low wire fence.

Mickey rested a hand on the fence rail, stared at him. "Take off the hood."

Ian did.

Neither of them spoke, but Ian couldn't meet Mickey's eyes. He trained his own on the ground, fixed on the paw prints of some stray dog. Sorely he wished to slip away in the shadows of those small paw prints, wished he was every inch the stray dog he felt like. Maybe some stranger would shed pity on him and take him in. Love him. And maybe he'd be dumb enough to love them in return.

There was still no sound from Mickey, and Ian chanced a glance at the older boy. He was drinking his coffee, blue eyes trained on Ian's face. He was expressionless, perfectly unreadable. It made his neck itch and his clothing feel too tight. He wanted to escape the harsh scrutiny but couldn't bear to leave. It had been hard enough the first time.

"Fuck you, Gallagher." Mickey said eventually, spitting on the ground at his feet before turning. He stomped back to his porch, his hand digging in his pocket for another cigarette.

Ian had started slowly shuffling away, heart in his mouth and his soul a shattered mess on the pavement. The only glue that seemed to work on him was the smile of a man who had forgotten how.

He made it across the street before impulse had him turning around. He saw it, just a small, barely noticeable twitch. Maybe he imagined it. But he could have sworn Mickey was staring back at him, eyes looking soft and his mouth turned up at the corners.

No part of him was whole, but he thought maybe, just maybe, he wasn't done picking up the pieces quite yet.


End file.
